The Art of Sound
evasconcellos
2011-05-25
CJ Combs is a humble sound engineer, giving him an extra insight to all things aural. He also happens to be an avid gamer, so when he combines his hobby with his trade, he’s able to deliver some great analysis and insight with the audio elements found in games. With that in mind, he took a look at the audio found in Medal of Honor and Battlefield: Bad Company 2, drawing on his expertise to give an extra viewpoint to one of the more major aspects of games.
His first review was for the sound in the single player campaign for Medal of Honor (2010), which he gave an overall score of 9/10, with extra praise for the music, voice acting/dialogue, and the weapon audio for the game. “Ramin Djawadi did an awesome job of getting the player into the setting and feeling of conflict through his soundtracks throughout the game,” says Combs. “When the goosebumps rose and the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end, I knew that the music certainly did its job.” When talking about the dialogue, Combs points out the solid voice acting, and another slick effect. “As far as the sound, the developers were very clever in ways to give depth and distance to the dialog. For instance, when you are talking to your squad mates and they are far away, it clearly sounds like radio chatter, but as soon as your squad mate comes closer to your proximity, you can not only hear the radio chatter, but you can also hear their voice as well. That we really cool.”
The audio from Battlefield: Bad Company 2 multiplayer also earned high praise, with Combs giving it a 10/10 rating for sound. This impressive rating was due to all the facets found within the soundscape of Bad Company 2. According to Combs, the ambient noise was awesome; the dialogue helps you with your gameplay; vehicle sounds were perfect; the equipment, while subtle, is great; weapon audio is knocked out of the park. All these aspects equate to a perfect score in this sound engineer’s ears, leading him to say “DICE did a fabulous job with Battlefield: Bad Company 2 MP. There is not much bad I can write about it from a sound perspective. I certainly cannot wait to see how #BF3 shapes up.”
Thanks to Mr. Combs for the great audio analysis! As you may have noticed, this sound expert is looking forward to the sound design for Battlefield 3, and with good reason. With the power of the Frostbite 2 engine, an entirely new soundscape will bring unprecedented levels of immersion, but we’ll leave it to our pals at DICE to explain that soon enough...
